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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/26549452">The Inquisitor Remains</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/Chesire22/pseuds/Chesire22'>Chesire22</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Dragon Age: Inquisition</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Gen</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-09-19</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-09-19</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-18 08:55:32</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>General Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>1,020</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/26549452</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/Chesire22/pseuds/Chesire22</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Grace Trevelyan sees Solas for the first time in two years and deals with his revelations</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Female Inquisitor &amp; Solas (Dragon Age), Inquisitor &amp; Solas (Dragon Age), Trevelyan/Cullen (mentioned)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>2</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>The Inquisitor Remains</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Grace stares at the Eluvian, her mouth gaping like some stupid cow.<br/>
Her arm, the striking shots of pain and power are no longer there, there isn’t anything there anymore. She knows, she knows but she can’t bear to look at it.<br/>
Just the ugliness of it.<br/>
Her face is wet, when did she start crying. She didn’t cry when she knew the mark would consume her, she didn’t cry after the Conclave when she walked over Thomas’ ashes, she did not cry when Haven fell or she left Stroud to his fate but now, she is weeping like a baby.<br/>
She can’t remember this last time she cried like this.<br/>
It’s feels wrong, she wants to be angry, she wants to curse him, he, from day one, he knew, he knew that the mark, His Mark¸ would consume her, she wondered if he ever truly cared for her, did he ever see as a friend or was she just some tool, the only option no matter how broken to fix his mess.<br/>
The mirror is black, locked from her, and she prays, Maker Please, she pleads, Don’t let him see me, let there be no witnesses to this. She keels forward and sobs, she sobs in frustration, another task stands before her, another Corypheus to face. She cries in anger, having no other way to express, despite everything, despite that she would have torn each and every Qunari apart to keep him safe, (not that he needed the help), the betrayal is there, When did you stop seeing me as a thing? Did you ever?<br/>
She rages, the air grows cold and brittle. She laughs at the embarrassment of it, her arms (arm), bare now shiver, she did this sometimes when judging prisoners, to scare them but that was different, there, she was in control, she was a force of nature, she should be feared.<br/>
This?<br/>
This was a child, whose magic pulsed out in ignorance, making her family sick from a cold that could not be blocked.<br/>
This is beneath her, this is an embarrassment to herself.<br/>
She wished she could stop.<br/>
Her sobs become wracked, choking things. If anything, she will stop out of pure fatigue, that’s something.<br/>
She can’t feel her arm.<br/>
She knows it’s there of course, she clutches the left with her right but she cannot feel the grip and against her fingers, it feels wrong, burnt, flaking, slick, rotting, rotting, get it off, GET IT OFF!<br/>
There seems to be no passage of time here, she could stay here, stay here forever until the world burns, she did not have to fight this, fight her friend, she could not.<br/>
The selfishness of the thought spurs her, her wracked wails stop, she looks at the simple gold band hanging from her neck, she couldn’t wear it on her ring finger, not the way it was. Her left arm flopped uselessly as she dropped it, rolling the simple band through her fingers.<br/>
Cullen<br/>
She breaths his name like a prayer, she can’t leave him, she won’t, truthfully she does not have the strength, selfish as it is.<br/>
She is a petty person truly.<br/>
She made a promise, death will not come so soon for them. They would be husband and wife, they would have their family, it would be so fucking symbolic.<br/>
She lets out a breath, one last shaky breath. Maybe she needed that, to let out everything that had weighed down on her since the Conclave, Maker, who was she before that, she remembered Solas asking once if the Anchor had changed her, she did not think it had but now, she wondered.<br/>
If she could back she would answer plainly, not politely stand his condescending praise, who she was before the mark didn’t matter, she was the Herald of Andraste and like Andraste before her she faced an impossible task.<br/>
Spread the Chant.<br/>
Show this world deserved to be spared.<br/>
Maker give me strength, she looks at the mirror, she can make herself out, ever so slight, her arm, is blackened, burned, infected by magic that should have never seen this age.<br/>
But she does not cry again, she will not.<br/>
She will save her friend, if she cannot, no, not an option, she will not see him tainted by this world, she refuses to let him become a monster, the Dread Wolf, the demon the Dalish say he is.<br/>
She hoped she could.<br/>
She looks at the mirror, her face is red, she will have to back through the Eluvian, her face all red and splotchy and what will she say?<br/>
Simple really, Solas is Fen’Harel, he is going to destroy the world and I will save him.<br/>
Her face is composed, Grace is buried deep and the Inquisitor returns, she turns on her heel and does not look back.<br/>
____________________________________________________________<br/>
Her emotions are uncomfortable.<br/>
Even with the Anchor gone, its magic lingers, it always will, she will to others always be his other, one he crafted his equal and nemesis.<br/>
Still it is there, her rage, frustration and despair, emotions he mirrors, or perhaps it is her that takes his anguish, takes a luxury that neither have and simply loses herself in the whirl of emotions.<br/>
He feels her tears, as though it was him weeping but he cannot.<br/>
He closes his eyes, allows himself this small indulgence as her rage, fear and despair harden and steel, and then all that remains is determination, if he was anyone else, he would probably fear the creature that no doubt was heading his way.<br/>
But he knows Grace Trevelyan far too well to see her as just his adversary, or maybe his redemption but it is a hollow one, because, he scowls at his own thoughts, she is exceptional, she alone cannot prove this world’s worth, but seeing her, and those he fought alongside in the Inquisition, he will remember and mourn them.<br/>
He wishes there was another way but he cannot fault his course.<br/>
Solas lets out a breath, he steels himself and the Dread Wolf walks away, he looks back.</p>
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